Anything Can Happen in the Next Half Hour
by Samantha Winchester
Summary: A fish out of water story. Literally.


_**AUTHOR'S NOTES:**_

_Me, posting two fics in one day? There must be something in the water... :-)_

_This story was written for the recent Tracy Island Writers Forum "Fish Out of Water" challenge. Despite my usual adherence to the 2026 timeline, in order to make this crossover fic work, __which it obviously wouldn't during the original series timeline, I've used the timeline from the Thunderbirds comics, which are set in 2065._

_My apologies to our Australian contingent if I've mangled your idioms too badly. I did my best!_

**Anything Can Happen In The Next Half Hour…**

He missed the first one, and would have missed the second if the deafening whine of turbines hadn't jerked him awake just in time.

Somewhere to his right, there was a huge smacking sound, like one of Thunderbird Two's pods hitting the ocean's surface fully loaded from five hundred feet. But John Tracy didn't even have time to glance in that direction before the wall of saltwater hit him. He tumbled helplessly toward the bow of the yacht, his progress only halted when his back struck the lower guard rail with an impact that nearly knocked the breath out of him. Gasping and spitting, all he could do was watch in awe as the sun flashed blindingly off something above him…something very large, something that appeared – impossibly – to have materialized out of nowhere directly over his head.

But no matter where it had come from, it was falling toward him, and fast.

There was nowhere to go. John threw his arms over his head, bracing himself for impact. He was almost launched into the air again as the thing smacked down right in front of him with a tremendous crash, splintering the deck surface like an eggshell. It bounced twice, the second time leaping high enough to plow straight through the wheelhouse structure, the observation lounge windows below it shattering in its wake and raining down bulletproof glass like hail.

Then it was over. John remained frozen in place for a long minute, listening to his own harsh breathing and the incredibly mundane sound of the waves, slapping gently against the hull of the yacht. Then he slowly unwrapped himself and raised his head, scraping the soaked hair out of his eyes.

Bizarrely, he realized he'd half expected it to be gone…that surreal moment of "this can't be happening to me" that often strikes during an unexpected disaster. But it was still there, lying on the deck at the end of a deep furrow of shredded steel and spectacularly splintered fiberglass that used to be the forward superstructure of the _Lucille._

If he hadn't known better, he would have sworn it was a fish. If they made fish out of metal, that was.

Arms bleeding from several shallow cuts – probably made by flying glass shards, although he couldn't detect any actual glass in any of them – John reached behind him and got a hold of the upper bow rail. He hauled himself slowly and painfully to his feet, wincing as he discovered that his inelegant tumble to safety had not only bruised the hell out of his back but also stripped several layers of skin off his knees. Feeling like he'd gone ten rounds with George Foreman and all five of his identically named sons, he stood there for a moment, staring at this strange machine that had made such a mess of his father's prized, 175 foot, eight cabin, ocean going yacht.

Eight cabin. _Jesus, Gordon. And the crew! _The thought hit him like a punch in the gut. All of them were below decks. And they were now effectively trapped there. Providing, of course, they'd survived the impact.

He whipped his left wrist up to his mouth…and stopped, staring in frustration at the strip of paler skin that encircled it. His wristcom, along with his cell phone, had been on the table beside the deck lounger that he'd been catching rays on before this…_thing_ had fallen out of the sky.

He lifted his eyes again, gaze tracking across the wreckage of the wheelhouse – and by extension the companionway that led down to _Lucille's_ luxury cabins. It looked like a hurricane had hit it…any way down was totally blocked off, like a basement rendered inaccessible by the collapse of the house above. It struck him for the first time how incredibly lucky they'd all been that the strange machine hadn't exploded on impact…they would all have been toast. Literally.

He breathed deeply, fighting down a wave of helplessness by taking inventory. He soon found it was easier to make a list of what he _didn't_ have…no radio, no communicator, no way of calling for help. Not even an ax to hack through the deck. And drawing on experience, one of the things his father continually stressed, didn't help at all. In the time since International Rescue had begun operating, he'd only been out on two rescues as a field operator, and neither of them had been on the water, miles and miles from anywhere. He knew everything about space, or pretty near everything…and pretty much nothing about a situation like this.

Now, if somebody had decided to ram the space shuttle…

For some reason, that sounded hysterically funny to him all of a sudden.

_Get a grip, Johnny._ What had Scott always said? _Starve the imagination and feed the will. All you can do is what you can do. The rest has to take care of itself._

Not that Scott had ever listened to his own advice.

The thing sat there, perfectly still now - silent except for the popping, cracking sounds of its outer skin as it cooled. The more he looked at it, treading gingerly forward on what was left of the deck behind it, the more it looked like what John had first thought…a fish. From this angle it even reminded him quite a bit of Chloe, Gordon's enormous and much bragged about goldfish from third grade at Valley Falls Elementary, back home in Kansas. Only Chloe, despite her statistically improbable size, hadn't been even close to as big as this thing…sixty feet long at a conservative estimate, artificially crafted scales fanning out in jointed circles like metal petticoats, tapering toward the tail from the oversized, bulbous head and body. He was no engineer, but it looked to him like it might be segmented, like a child's toy snake that he had seen in a museum once, carved from jointed pieces of wood so that the body could imitate the flexibility of the creature it was fashioned after. He could see what looked like observation ports, big and dark and circular, one on either side of the "head." He couldn't see any signs of life from inside, or any way in to see if there had been anybody on board.

He wondered what Brains and Virgil, who _were_ engineers, would make of this. He wished they were here.

He wished _anyone_ else were here.

* * *

Gordon Tracy's first thought as consciousness drifted back was that he had just been most profoundly robbed. _The best hand of the day, and it was _mine! _I had them right where I wanted them._ _And then…_

Then. What?

He opened his eyes, wondering why he was lying flat on his back on the floor. And why there was a large, jagged chunk of what looked like riveted steel protruding through the ceiling above his head.

There was a scuffle nearby and a groan, then the sound of something heavy hitting the floor. By the time Gordon could turn his head in that direction, Bruno Fitzgerald, _Lucille's_ burly, spiky-haired, bungee jumping Australian chef, was crouching beside him. "Hey, Gordon. You all right, mate?"

Gordon rubbed the back of his head. He could feel a sizeable bump forming, tender to the touch. "I think so, man. What the hell _happened_?"

Bruno helped him to a sitting position. "Beats me. Last thing I remember…" he broke off, following Gordon's eyes toward the ceiling. "Whoa. Looks like we had a bit of a prang there."

Gordon used Bruno's shoulder to lever himself to his feet, staring upwards. "Pretty safe bet. But the question is, what…"

A groan from nearby made them swing around. The tables in the crew lounge, bolted to the floor, were still in place, but the chairs and every other loose piece of furniture and fittings were strewn around like firewood. Two white-clad legs stuck out from under a small pile of debris near the porthole. Gordon and Bruno cleared two chairs, a half empty bottle of scotch, two shot glasses and what looked like a year's subscription to Time Magazine off the prone body of Diego Carlos da Silva, _Lucille's_ handsome Brazilian steward. Blood trickled in a thin line down his temple and into his hair. "Diego? Can you hear me?"

Diego groaned again, moving his mouth as if trying to say something, but didn't open his eyes. Gordon did the best examination of his head and neck that he could, then checked for other obvious injuries. Diego seemed to have lapsed into full unconsciousness now, but his breathing was regular, his pulse stable. "Pinch test response is good, but I need to check his pupils… Where's the nearest first aid kit?"

"Should be one next door. Hang on, I'll get it."

"I want to make sure Diego's stable before we go looking for the others." Gordon's head was starting to ache. He rubbed his forehead reflexively. "Mike shouldn't be too far away…I think he went to the head right before we…before. Man, I hope Captain Georgio wasn't in the wheelhouse."

"Don't think so," Bruno offered. "Last I saw him he was headed below to get some paperwork done."

Gordon nodded. "Sit tight," Bruno said. "I'll be back in a jiffy."

He was almost out of the door when Gordon remembered. His brother John was on board, they'd just picked him up in Sydney. "John!" he said urgently. "Bruno, _where's Johnny?"_

Bruno stared at him. Then, slowly and reluctantly, he raised his eyes to the ceiling.

All the blood drained out of Gordon's face, leaving it pinched and white.

* * *

John worked his way slowly around the starboard side of the metal fish machine, hunting for any way to get down below decks. A hatch, a hole, a crack, _anything_. But so far it had been a difficult and utterly fruitless search. As he picked his way over the jagged, treacherous wreckage, he kept being reminded of a tornado that had leveled several large buildings in a nearby town to their Kansas home, when he had been still a teenager in school there. Although hundreds of volunteers had searched for days, it had all been for nothing, because nobody had survived. They didn't pull one living person from the rubble. He remembered the faces of the searchers, sitting there exhausted, covered with dust and dirt. Eyes empty with the slow destruction of hope. 

_If Scott could hear you now, he'd be seriously on your case for always seeing the worst case scenario,_ he realized, trying to shake himself out of the morbid direction his thoughts had taken. His eldest brother had somehow always managed to show the outside world a face of relentless positivity, something John reluctantly and secretly admired. He knew that Scott, three years older than second born Virgil and the only one old enough to remember everything that had happened the night their mother had died, had always had more pressure and more responsibility on his shoulders than the rest of them. He'd been their rock and their anchor for so long, and John had no idea how on earth he managed to do all that he did and never let the cracks show.

Except at night, when he didn't sleep.

John almost jumped right out of his skin when the loudhailer bellowed from beside him.

"_Unknown yacht, identify yourself!"_

John twisted toward the sound, almost jamming his foot into a crack between two broken pieces of fiberglass. He caught the siderail to steady himself and stared at what was floating on the water about fifty yards away.

It was a submarine, but not like any he'd seen before. She was probably in the region of sixty feet long, riding sleek and low in the water, with rakishly tilted rear fins and a sail that more closely resembled the forward superstructure of a luxury launch than the conning tower of a submarine. But his gaze rested then on the long dark slashes of her forward torpedo tubes, which left no doubt that he was looking at an attack boat – as Gordon would have termed it. He was suddenly very glad that the voice hailing him had been American.

"This is the private yacht _Lucille_, registration Sydney," he called back, hoping they could hear him as well as talk to him. "My name's John Tracy. We've had some kind of…accident, here. There are people trapped below decks who may be hurt. Can you give us assistance?"

There was a long silence, then the voice again. It had a definite edge of command to it, reminding John irresistibly of both his father and his eldest brother. It was that military thing. He had no idea how Gordon had escaped it. "Affirmative, Mr. Tracy. We'll do our best. Stand by."

A high whine he'd heard somewhere before cut the air, and he saw the submarine's single rear turbine begin to rotate slowly. The sleek craft sliced through the water's surface toward him, turning slightly as she came closer, maneuvering to come alongside. As she did so, he saw the name emblazoned on her midsection, just above the waterline, for the first time.

_Stingray._

* * *

"Gordon to John. Gordon to John. Come in, John." Gordon stared grimly at his silent communicator. "Dammit, Johnny, you have to be there. Come in!" 

Silence. Not even the buzz of static. Gordon swore in frustration, fighting the serious urge to wreck something. He'd been trying both John and Alan in Thunderbird Five at regular intervals in their search for Mike Polacek, _Lucille's_ engineer, and the yacht's captain, Georgio Petros. They'd found Mike quickly – he had been trapped in the head by a spear of metal that had sliced straight through the deck and buried itself in the floor plates – three feet further aft and the Slavik-featured, retired naval officer would have been speared like a kabob inside the narrow little compartment. Bruno had found a fire axe and hacked through the door, and they'd got him out, shaken but none the worse for his experience.

The captain had found them, giving them all a scare as he came around the corner of the passageway in front of them, his head, face and shoulders covered with blood, holding one arm against his body. The blood had come from a scalp wound that, while it had bled profusely, wasn't immediately dangerous, but his arm was broken and Gordon could tell that he was in a lot more pain than he was willing to show. He'd given Captain Georgio, as everyone on board always called him, as much first aid as he would allow, cleaning up the headwound and putting his arm into a fiberglass support brace to immobilize it, but the poker faced Greek refused any painkiller strong enough to really help him, saying that he didn't want to impair his ability to think.

Not that thinking was doing any of them any good. They had gone as far forward as they could below decks, only to have their progress halted by a wall of rubble aft of where the companionway would have been. It was useless. There just wasn't any way to get out.

They returned to the crew lounge and sat there while Gordon tried one more time to reach someone. Anyone. Bruno winced sympathetically at his stream of frustrated invective when the effort failed once again. "No point in chucking a wobbly, mate. We'll think of something."

Gordon nodded, taking a deep breath. "Captain Georgio, what about the radio in your quarters?"

The captain shook his grizzled head. "Is no good. I try before I come to find you. Is receiving nothing. Antenna is gone, I think."

_Along with the rest of what was up there, probably,_ Gordon thought. He forced his mind away from that train of thought, running his hand through his hair. He wouldn't allow himself to think about what might have happened to John right then. He had to concentrate on things he could fix.

Or things he had to figure out a way to fix…like _Lucille's_ slow but definite list to starboard, which was getting worse by the minute.

His headache had gotten worse, and he reached for another packet of aspirin. "Okay. Let's go over it again. There has to be something we're missing here."

* * *

John was feeling more and more out of his depth by the moment. He stood a few feet behind the two uniformed men who had introduced themselves only as Troy and Phones, watching as they stared up at the front of the strange metal fish that had landed on _Lucille's _now quite badly slanting deck. They were talking to each other in low tones, and he could only make out a word every now and again – words that sounded like "Titan," "terror fish," "aquaphibians" and "Commander Shore." The first three rang no bells at all, much like the rest of the incomprehensible marine terms they threw back and forth, reminding him of just how much of a fish out of water he was in this situation. No pun intended. 

The name "Shore," though, did feel familiar, somehow. If he could just figure out where he'd heard it before…

"Uh…Troy?" John addressed the handsome, dark haired one of the pair, who by his air of authority was obviously in charge, although John didn't know how to read the rank on his uniform. The only thing he could identify with any certainty was the World Aquanaut Security Patrol patch on their sleeves and caps. "I'm getting the impression that you two know what this thing is."

It was the quieter, softer voiced one who answered him. "That information is classified, Mr. Tracy. I'm sorry."

"To hell with that!" John couldn't help the angry outburst. "This thing fell out of the sky, wrecked my father's yacht and trapped everyone else on this ship below decks. If you know what it is and where it came from, I think I deserve for you to at least tell me!"

"The less you know, Mr. Tracy, the better off you are. Believe me." Troy tensed a little, as if preparing for a fight, his easy demeanor betraying just a hint of steel underneath.

"We've got help on the way," Phones added. "There's no way to get them out without cutting gear, in any case."

John nodded grudgingly, trying to force down his frustration. "I know. I just…it's killing me, I don't know if they're alive or dead. And one of the guys down there is my brother." He searched their faces for a sign that he was making some kind of headway. "For Christ's sake, he's WASP. Like you. At least, he was."

"Was?"

"He was the only survivor of the _Sea Griffin_," John said through gritted teeth, hating having to say the words. The memories were too fresh, too vivid, and it was too soon for him to revisit that ugly dark scar across his mind.

"Your brother is Gordon Tracy?" Troy raised one thick, dark eyebrow, studying him in a way that reminded John, just for a second, of Scott. He glanced at Phones, then nodded. "I think Phones and I would like to know if he made it, too. And we've got just the woman for the job."

* * *

"Hijacked?" Mike Polacek looked at Bruno, eyebrows raised. "By whom?" 

"Pirates, mate. It's obvious, can't you see?" Bruno spread his hands at the stares he received. "I kid you not. Two mates of mine worked a cruise in the South China Sea, last year. Got themselves fired on and robbed, two days out of Hong Kong. Most of the crew took off in the lifeboats when they saw 'em coming, the bastards."

"Is possible," Captain Georgio added slowly. "I have heard of such things, although never in these waters."

Gordon sighed wearily. "This trip just keeps on getting better and better. Okay, so assuming we're looking at hostiles, we'd better get ready to repel boarders. Captain, we're going to have to break open the weapons locker."

He was about to stand up when he saw Bruno staring past him, eyes wide. He turned to see that the Australian chef was looking at the porthole, now several feet under the water line. At something that couldn't possibly be there.

It was a woman. One of the most beautiful women Gordon had ever seen, with long, flowing hair – hair with a distinctly _green_ tinge – and clothing that shimmered and swirled around her lithe body as if it was made of the sea itself. She wore no breathing apparatus of any kind, yet floated perfectly still, not showing any of the telltale signs of effort, or that she might be holding her breath.

_I can't be seeing this. Beings like her don't exist, they're just a sailor's fantasy._ Gordon stood up slowly, moving like a sleepwalker toward the porthole. She nodded at him, then raised the object she was holding in her hands. It was a white board, and on it was written HELP COMING. HOW MANY ALIVE?

Mutely, he held up one hand, displaying all five digits. She nodded again to show she understood, then with a flick of her body she was suddenly gone from sight, leaving only a trail of tiny bubbles to mark her passage.

Gordon stared at the place where she had been. "Tell me you all saw that," he said after a long moment, his voice sounding hoarse to his own ears.

Bruno was beside him, squeezing his shoulder. "We saw it, mate," he sighed, wistfully. "But nobody'll ever believe us."

* * *

Barely paying attention to the medic who was inspecting the cuts on his arms, John watched intently as the crew of the freighter that had pulled up alongside the _Lucille_ thirty minutes before worked to fasten a massive collar around the body of the metal fish machine. It seemed obvious that these were WASP men, despite their featureless coveralls and lack of insignia, and that the freighter was about as civilian as _Stingray_ herself. He had tried to ask questions, but found quickly that these men were just as close mouthed as Troy and Phones. 

At length the job was completed, the actinic flare of the last welding torch was extinguished, and the men straightened up and removed their masks. One of them walked over and spoke to Troy, receiving a nod in response. The man pulled out a radio and spoke into it.

They had refused to allow John access to a radio, no matter how much he badgered them. But at least he knew, thanks to some mysterious third operative aboard Stingray that he never saw, that Gordon and the four man skeleton crew were alive and awaiting rescue.

He just wished someone would let him rescue them.

Something was happening aboard the freighter. John accepted the jacket he was offered by the medic once his wounds had been dressed, then crossed to the siderail to watch. The aft deck of the freighter was sliding open, and up from the depths of the hull unfolded a massive, gleaming crane.

Troy and Phones waved everyone well back from the metal fish machine as the crane locked into place and began to swing its business end sideways toward the deck of the _Lucille._ Guided by the man with the radio, a massive hook as big as a man's body slowly lowered until it was right above the collar welded to the fish machine's scales. Then the man waved the rest of the crew forward and inch by inch, they pushed, pulled and shoved the hook through a huge loop in the top of the collar.

Then, slowly, carefully, the crane took up the slack and began to lift the huge metal-scaled machine off the deck. Fiberglass popped and shattered around it as it was pulled free of the wreckage, and then, suddenly, it was free, floating in midair. John had a brief flashback to when he had first seen it, swooping toward him at terrifying speed. He shook his head, blinking away the vision.

Troy and Phones came over to him. "Thank you for your cooperation, Mr. Tracy," Troy said. "We'll be on our way now."

"We'd like to remind you that it would be in the interests of global security if you didn't talk about what you've seen today to anyone," Phones added.

John stared at him. "That's it? You ride in, you take your…_thing_ and disappear?"

Troy nodded. "Yep. That's about the size of it."

John was thirteen again, kept on the outside of the "big boy" secrets by Scott and Virgil. "That…that _sucks,_" he exclaimed – feeling monumentally stupid the moment the words escaped his mouth.

Troy stared at him for a moment, then started to laugh. "Yeah, I guess it does."

He fished in the pocket of his pants and came up with something that he concealed in his hand. He indicated that John should hold his own hand up, and he lowered the object into it.

John stared down at his wristcom, a little scratched and battered but otherwise looking like it was in one piece. He looked back up at Troy, who was giving him that coolly appraising look again.

"Tell you what, Mr. Tracy," Troy said. "You let us keep our secrets, and we'll let you keep yours. Deal?"

Phones grinned, looking away over the water toward the freighter, which was now lowering the big metal fish machine toward its own deck.

"But…" John spluttered. "What about my brother? And my crew? We're _sinking_, in case you hadn't noticed!"

"Relax, Mr. Tracy. Like Phones told you, help's on the way. It'll be here in plenty of time. These people are known for their fast response." Troy flipped him a salute, turned and walked back in the direction of his submarine, Phones close on his heels.

Speechless, John trailed after them, unable to do anything but watch them board the sub. A last wave and they had disappeared below, and moments later John heard the sound of turbines again as _Stingray_ slipped beneath the surface and was gone.

And suddenly, he knew where he had heard that sound before. It was what had woken him up, just in time to save him from being wiped out by the metal monster that had crashlanded on their deck. And right after that, there had been that almighty splash…

But all he had was questions, and no answers at all.

He almost jumped out of his skin when his wristcom began to beep at him insistently. "John," he said automatically, raising it up.

"Johnny! Oh, thank God, you're alive!" It was Gordon, looking tired and disheveled but very, very relieved.

"Yeah, I'm okay," John said, watching the freighter steam off rapidly into the distance. The crew had covered the big metal fish with tarps and the crane was gone, lowered back below decks. It all looked completely innocent, now. "Is everyone all right down there?"

"We've got a couple of injuries, but I think they'll pull through," Gordon said. "We've been trying to call for help but we couldn't make ourselves heard until now. What in the hell _happened_ up there?"

John couldn't help an ironic smile. "Gordo, I have no freaking idea. But you would have loved it. First of all a sixty foot metal fish crashed into the deck right in front of me, and then these two WASP guys showed up in a submarine called _Stingray_…"

"_Stingray_?" Gordon's eyes looked like they were about to pop out of his head. "You – saw – _Stingray?_"

"Well, yeah, but…"

"Bro, _nobody's_ seen _Stingray!_ Nobody! We've only heard rumors! All we know is that Sam Shore is in charge of the operation, and we think they have her stashed at this new top secret base called Marineville. I can't believe you actually _saw_ her! Damn everything, this is so not fair!"

John couldn't help a smile at the envy dripping from his younger brother's words. "Don't worry, Gordo. I got a good look at her. We get home, I'll have Virgil draw you a picture."

The emergency interrupt code flashed across the wristcom's screen, and Gordon's face was replaced by Alan's. "You might not have to wait that long," he said. "Scott and Virgil are on their way. ETA ten minutes."

"But," John said, surprised, "how did you know?"

"Dad got a call," Alan said. "Some WASP guy named Shore. He said you guys were out there in trouble and he should call International Rescue."

Shore. John shook his head. Of course. Commander Sam Shore, the younger brother of his father's old college roommate – and a fellow Kansan who had gone on to a stellar career in WASP that not even a combat injury that had landed him in a hoverchair could derail. He had visited Gordon during his recovery, offering support and encouragement.

"FAB, Al," John said, trying to empty his mind again of those dark times in the hospital. "Patch Scott through to me, would you?"

"FAB. He'll be right with you."

Alan's face disappeared and Gordon's came back. "Did you hear all that?" John asked.

"Sure did. But before Scott comes on, Johnny… I need to ask you something." Gordon glanced at someone beside him for a moment, then looked back earnestly at John. "With everything that was going on up there, you didn't happen to see…well…a…uh…_mermaid_…did you…?"

John rolled his eyes. "Now, that, Gordo, really _is_ a crazy thing to say."

_The End_

* * *

_**AUTHOR'S NOTES:**_

_For non-"Stingray" fans, "WASP" is the acronym for World Aquanaut Security Patrol, which Gordon was also a member of at one time._

_And as a bit of visual interest, if you go to Stingray Online (thunderbirdsonlineDOTcoDOTukFORWARD SLASHstingrayFORWARD SLASHindexDOThtm (I can't put the actual link here, even an abbreviated form, because the site automatically deletes it), you'll see the animated clip that inspired this story. Just imagine what would have happened if the "Lucille" had been in the water right in the middle of that jump, and only Stingray made it all the way over the top of the yacht... _


End file.
